Income inequality is once again the rallying cry for Barack Obama, Harry Reid, Mark Begich and the Democrats for this election cycle.

None of us should be surprised. Candidate Barack Obama in 2008 revealed the central tenet of his governing philosophy to a famous plumber with a good first name, “I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.”

Though Barack Obama lied to the American people about keeping their healthcare and their doctors, in this instance he told truth. He and the Democrats have spread the wealth around and when there was not enough in the Treasury to meet our current obligations, they borrowed and printed trillions more and spread it too.

Here in Alaska Mark Begich runs ads about being “as independent as Alaska.” What he must mean is his actions in Washington are independent of his rhetoric at home.

Big Government Begich holsters a rubber stamp with a big fat “YES” on it: ObamaCare, Yes; trillion dollar stimulus bill, Yes; for the nuclear option to end the filibuster and push radical nominees through the senate, Yes; for nearly $8 trillion in new debt since taking office a mere 5 years ago, Yes; Voting 91 percent of the time with Harry Reid and the Democrats, YES! So much for being an independent voice for Alaska.

Margaret Thatcher wisely observed, “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.” And Ronald Reagan said that it always leads to “shared scarcity.”

You and I both know a diminishing future is not the calling or destiny of America. We didn’t declare our independence from Great Britain only to become dependent on the federal government to run our lives. We declared independence from Great Britain precisely because it was trying to undermine our economic and political freedom. We believed, and still must believe, that all are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among these are “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

Any success or prosperity we are experiencing as a nation now is because of the foundation laid at the beginning. We are still riding on the momentum of what our Founding Fathers set in motion. The promise of America is equality of opportunity for the people to exercise their God-given talents, not equality of outcome.

We cannot allow our nation to be lured by the sirens’ song that you can have liberty and big government socialism too. The two are mutually exclusive.

If you use the force of government to guarantee a certain outcome for everyone, you discourage the people from whom you take the money from working harder and taking risks and you encourage the people to whom you give the money to work less. The lesson of history is unmistakable. You end up with a far poorer society, and one in which power shifts primarily from the people to make choices to the government.

That is why I decided to run for the U.S. Senate. I cannot stand by and watch the American experiment in liberty die.

As Ronald Reagan once exhorted, it is time to begin the hard work of getting government back within its means and exercising less control over our daily lives. On these two principles, let there be no compromise.